Free You're Still the One by Janet Dailey, Elizabeth Bass, Cathy Lamb, Mary Carter Page B

slug.”
    “Uh . . .”
    “When he quit drinking the last three years, he started to talk about what a lousy father he was and he told me he didn’t think there was a worse husband on the planet.”
    I felt like I’d been struck in the face with a handful of paintbrushes.
    “He talked to his AA group about it, too.”
    His AA group? Darned if my jaw wasn’t almost on the floor. My dad had actually admitted he was an alcoholic? He went to AA?
    “I tried to get him to shape up that butt of his. I even prodded him with a pitchfork one time. Truly, I poked him in the butt, and I told him, ‘See, even when I prod your butt, Ben, you still won’t move to make amends for your cruel behavior to your daughter.’ I didn’t understand it. I’ve got six kids and fourteen grandkids and they’re over all the time, and I could not understand why he did not apologize to you and do whatever it took to make amends.”
    “You knew him—”
    “You bet I did, although the first two years he lived here we didn’t talk. I met him once the first year—he was a mean, slobbering, warthog drunk. He called me an old witch. We didn’t get along. But eventually I knew him backwards and forwards and inside out.” She tapped her boot. “I got him cleaned up three years ago. Told him he was an alcoholic. He argued, threw that temper tantrum of his. By golly, it didn’t scare me at all—they’re all in denial, but he had his accident, you know—”
    “No, what accident?”
    “Oh, that’s right. You didn’t know because he was a crappy father and out of your life. Flipped his truck late one night. He was stuck upside down like a pig hung out to slaughter. It happened right down the road in the curve where that steel goat statue stands in front of Shelby’s house. He’s a steel artist.
    “Anyhow, I galloped my horse, Give Me A Shiner—that’s her name—pretty darn fast when I heard the crash, but when I saw that it was him and I smelled liquor I peered in and said to him, ‘Hello and good-bye, you pathetic drunk. You could have killed someone or knocked over a cow.’ He was trapped, hanging upside down, and I galloped away. He yelled and slurred and swore and, by God, I left him there after I told him, ‘Tonight I’m going to pray to the good Lord that wisdom will be forced into your dense head.’ ”
    I scrambled to keep up with her. “You left my dad upside-down, drunk, in his truck all night?”
    “Sure I did. Although I think he was able to unstrap himself later. He was still flattened out, though, stuck in that crushed truck of his.”
    I almost laughed. I have a mean streak when it comes to my dad.
    “You gotta let drunks hit the very bottom rung of their lives, or they’re not getting better. By the time I rode back out about eight hours later, after my morning coffee, he’d made a mess all over himself in each direction. Lucky it was summer so he didn’t freeze, but he was still cold. Hungover and screwed up—that gave him a God moment, I think. Can you get much lower?”
    “That’s pretty low.” I stood and marveled. I was totally amused at the thought of Dad upside-down. That’s what a drunken parent who calls you apple-core face does to you. They warp your sense of humor.
    “I peered into the window and said, ‘You ready to change now, you donkey’s ass?’ He was crying. Broken. Like a bird with all the bones shattered here and there, the feathers of his wings all falling off. I hate to see a man crumble down to nothing, but he had to have that sweet meltdown. He nodded his head and vomited, so I called the police and a tow truck. They came. Ambulance took him to the hospital. I wasn’t going to take him smelling to the high heavens like that. He had to stay there for three nights.”
    “What were his injuries?”
    “Oh, a bunch of ’em. Self-deserved, by golly. Broken leg, broken arm, concussion. Dehydration. He’d tossed his cookies. Bruises. Bumps on his noggin. Truck was totaled. He